


Pyramids and Dragon Runes

by celtic7irish



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-09
Updated: 2014-09-09
Packaged: 2018-02-16 17:46:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,808
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2278926
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/celtic7irish/pseuds/celtic7irish
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bill Weasley is a curse breaker working in Egypt.  Unfortunately, he's come across runes that he's never seen the like of before.  The only familiar symbol is that of a dragon.  But Draconian is a dead language.  Isn't it?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pyramids and Dragon Runes

**Author's Note:**

  * For [csichick_2](https://archiveofourown.org/users/csichick_2/gifts).



> First off, I haven't written about side characters in a long time, so I apologize for whatever OOCness is here (and there's a lot of it). Also, this is not beta'd, so again, all mistakes are mine. Also, this is pre-Voldemort's demise. Not that it really matters.

Bill stared tiredly at the hieroglyphs on the wall in front of him, his wand raised as he cast a faint glow over the symbols.  He had been working on deciphering the code for nearly a week now, and was no closer to cracking the code than he had been when he’d started.  So far, the only image he’d been able to – maybe – identify was a painted figure of what he guessed was a dragon.  It looked like he might have to give his brother a call.  According to Charlie, dragons had their own language, though he had never heard of it being written before.  But Bill was out of ideas, and he needed to figure out what the writing said so the archeologists could get through into the pyramid’s primary chamber.  The last thing he needed was to miss a warning about traps or dark magic or some other unexpected problem that would cause them nothing but headaches later.

One of his team members hollered down the hallway, and Bill turned away from the wall he’d been facing, stumbling back towards the opening, carefully picking his way around raised stones and piles of animal bones.  He blinked when he finally stepped into the open air, realizing that it was nearly as dark outside as it had been inside with only his wand and a handful of fairy lights to guide his steps.

Alfred, one of his fellow curse-breakers, grinned up at him.  “Hey, Bill!” he greeted.  “Any luck?”

Bill shook his head.  “Naw, nothing that we haven’t already discussed,” he admitted.  “I’m going to give Charlie a call, I think.  The birthing season should be over by now, so hopefully he can take some time away.  If not, I guess I’ll just have to send him pictures,” he grumbled.  He really hated doing things long-distance, because it usually meant that something important got missed or misinterpreted, and that could get somebody killed.

“Yeah, yeah, you just want an excuse to get your brother down here,” Alfred teased.

Bill grinned.  “Well, he’s certainly better company than you lot!” he retorted as the two men sauntered towards the camp that had been set up about a quarter mile away from the pyramid.  The air was growing steadily cooler, and Bill was looking forward to warm food and a heated tent.  During the daytime, he was usually inside the cooler temperatures of the pyramids, the stone radiating chill.

The camp was as busy as usual, with people going about their business.  Bill and his team hadn’t managed to gain access into the primary chamber, but they had been able to correctly interpret and break several other curses surrounding smaller chambers.  Some of those curses had been quite impressive, ranging anywhere from spontaneous combustion to being crushed by rocks or drowned in sand.  Typical curses in the pyramids in this region of Egypt, but nothing they hadn’t been expecting.  But the main chamber, in addition to being in a completely different, unknown language, practically radiated dark magic.  Breaking it wasn’t going to be easy, even if they managed to interpret the runes.  It might require some creative curse-breaking.  Bill had to admit, if only to himself, that he was looking forward to the challenge.

Thanking the disinterested man who handed him his dinner, Bill headed for his tent, ignoring the murmur of conversation around him.  A lot of it was just complaining, anyhow.  The archeologists needed curse-breakers if they wanted to explore the pyramids, but all curse-breakers worked for Gringotts, and their services weren’t exactly cheap.  In addition, the longer it took them to identify and break the curses, the greater the difficulty and the higher the price rose.  The goblins had been accused of price gouging by more than one dissatisfied customer, but never within their hearing.  Usually, it was the curse-breakers themselves that got the brunt of the complaints.

Once he was inside his tent – which he had to himself for this job – he set his food on the low table near his bed and settled into the chair, pulling out a quill and some parchment.  A quick spell increased the amount of light in the tent, and Bill wrote a quick missive to Charlie, asking if he was up for a trip to Egypt for a few days and suggesting that he bring along whatever knowledge he had about dragon-speak.

Grabbing his unused spoon, Bill turned it into a portkey and whistled.  One of the Gringotts owls flew into his tent a moment later, landing easily on the table and allowing him to tie the letter to his leg.  “Hey, Arcus, take this to Charlie Weasley, okay?”  The owl hooted in acceptance and permitted Bill to stroke his head before taking off with a powerful beat of his wings.  Bill stared blankly at the tent flaps before shaking his head and turning back to his food.  He was sure that Charlie would come when he could.  In the meantime, he’d continue to do his job.  There were still dozens of languages and hundreds of variations they hadn’t gone through yet.

After dinner, Bill changed into his sleep shirt and climbed into his cot, suddenly exhausted.  Of course, standing around in a pyramid, straining your eyes and reading dusty old tomes everyday had a tendency to do that to a person.  Grateful for the warmth, Bill closed his eyes and was asleep within moments.  Outside, the pyramid rose into the sky, dark and foreboding.  Deep inside of it, runes glowed in an eerie, sickly green and started to shift.  And in the camp, people went about their business, unaware of the approaching danger.

*~* 

Bill wasn’t even fully awake when Alfred came barging into his tent, blathering about runes and pyramids and shifting symbols.  Groaning, Bill fumbled for his wand.  Gripping it in lax fingers, he shot off a quick Stinging Hex, gratified to hear his friend yelp as it struck.  There was a muttered counter-spell, followed by some more scolding.  “Dammit, Weasley! This is serious.  Get your butt out here, now!” Alfred snapped before walking off.

With a sigh, Bill sat up, rubbing at his face and stumbling out of bed.  It had sounded urgent, so he just ran a few quick spells over himself to freshen up, then wandered out into the main camp.  As soon as he left the soundproof tent, he was bombarded by yelling and frantic activity.  He blinked in confusion, then reached out and snagged one of the helpers by the elbow as he hurried past.  “What’s going on?” he demanded of the boy.

Blue eyes blinked up at him, but the boy answered.  “I don’t know, sir,” he said.  “The other curse-breakers were saying something about the primary chamber and the runes changing overnight.  But I don’t know any more than that, honest.”  Bill nodded and let him go, his gaze turning thoughtful as the boy ran off to complete whatever errand he’d been sent on.

Deciding that he wasn’t going to get anything figured out just standing by his tent, Bill headed for the mess tent, determined to at least get some food in him before tackling whatever had everybody panicking.  It wasn’t possible for runes to alter themselves, not unless there was present, active magic.  And Bill hadn’t detected anything like that yesterday, which meant one of two things.  Either this magic was so different than anything he’d ever seen that the rules didn’t apply, or somebody was tampering with the digging site. 

Neither option was one that Bill wanted to contemplate, so his best hope was that Alfred and whoever had been with him was wrong.  After all, the others on his team had only seen the hieroglyphs for a brief time, before leaving Bill to start trying to translate while they went on to the smaller chambers.  So maybe they just hadn’t noticed certain details, and so the runes seemed different today.  Bill doubted he’d be that lucky – Alfred was pretty level-headed – but he could always hope.

After grabbing a tray of food for breakfast, Bill easily located the others, settling in next to Alfred at one of the round tables.  The other wizard glanced up at him for a moment before going back to the pictures he had been looking at before, murmuring to Harold, who was sitting next to him, scowling.  They seemed to be trying to find similarities between two sets of images, and Bill supposed that one was from yesterday, and the other from this morning.

“Any luck yet?” he asked after swallowing a few bites of breakfast.

Alfred shrugged.  “Not really.  The only thing that stayed the same is the dragon picture, and even then, it’s not exactly the same.”  He slid the two pictures over to Bill, who looked them over carefully.  The first one had the runes he remembered from the day before, glowing eerily in the darkened tunnel.  The second picture was so different that Bill almost thought he was looking at a different set of runes.  But these also glowed with that same sickly green color – something that none of the others hieroglyphs in the pyramid had done – which meant that chances were high that they were in the same place from yesterday.

Bill sought out the two dragons after a moment, his eyes narrowing speculatively.  He couldn’t really tell what species of dragon they were trying to represent, but he did notice the differences.  One had a longer neck, and a wider wingspan.  The other had sharp barbs on the end of its tail.  Both dragon runes had long claws, though the front legs were longer on the second one than on the first.

“I sent an owl to Charlie last night,” he murmured.  “He should be here soon, I hope.”  The others nodded in acknowledgment, and Bill was sort of surprised that none of them protested.  Then again, this was unlike anything they’d ever come across before, so Bill supposed that they were willing to try anything that might help, even if it meant calling on a civilian dragon-expert.

Breakfast was mostly a tense, unhappy affair, and as soon as Bill had swallowed the last of his eggs, he was heading out towards the pyramid.  Groups of archeologists stood around the base, talking.  None of them paid Bill any attention as he made his way into the main entrance, following his footsteps from the day before and heading towards the central chamber, his wand lit to help guide him.  Behind him, Alfred was still murmuring to Harold, their voices echoing dully in the passageway.

Slowing down as he reached the runes from the day before, Bill held his wand up and muttered a quick Lumos spell to increase the output of light.  The runes, fortunately, hadn’t changed again since the picture had been taken, and Bill’s left hand came up, hovering over the symbols as he ran through a short variety of spells, trying to figure out what had caused the runes to change.  It could be a proximity spell, or a scheduled one, or even a random one that they had simply come across at the right time.  Bill didn’t really believe in coincidences, but in his line of work, it did happen on occasion, where a curse would do something completely unexpected while following seemingly random rules that rarely made any actual sense.

Alfred and Harold busied themselves planting the fairy lights around Bill and the runes, careful not to edge so much as a toe over the line into the large chamber.  Bill ignored them, focusing on the pressure he could feel coming from the runes, warm against his palm.  It was almost as if the magic was alive.  Whatever the case might be, it was no longer dormant, and Bill eyed the runes warily, his gaze drawn again and again to the single dragon image amongst all the nonsense.  When had the runes changed? And why?  Bill didn’t know if that information was important, but it might be useful to know.

“Have the Draconian Language books arrived yet?” Bill asked.  If these runes were in the language of the dragons, then those books were probably their best shot.  This pyramid predated anything that Gringotts had possession of, however, and the goblins didn’t have anything useful regarding dragon-speak and dark magic, which was what Bill was staring at.  At least, he was pretty sure that’s what it was.

Harold checked the timetable and informed Bill that the books should arrive by lunchtime via owl.  Bill was tempted to go find a rock or stick or something and throw it into the chamber in the meantime, just to see what had happened.  Not only would his professional pride not let him follow through, however, but he had heard stories about others who had done that, only to wind up dead or trapped or out of a job when the entire structure collapsed into rubble, burying its secrets.  Bill was too good at his job to risk it all because of a minor spell of impatience.  Charlie would arrive via portkey soon enough, and then Bill could see if the younger Weasley had any insight into the strange, shifting runes.

None of Bill’s spells and counter-spells did anything, as far as he could tell, and he huffed.  That could be a good thing – it meant he hadn’t activated any curses – or a very bad thing – the harder a curse was to crack, the more violent and deadly it tended to be if activated.

Alfred interrupted Bill’s musings.  “D’you need anything else, Bill?” he asked.  “Harold’s group is heading for the deeper levels today, and they could use a few extra hands.”

Bill glanced at Harold, who just shrugged at him, and then shook his head.  “Nah, I’ve got this,” he reassured the other curse breaker.  “I’m just going to try a few more of the usual counters, and then set an alert on the whole thing so we know if it changes or something again.”

Alfred gave him a mock salute.  “All right, boss,” he replied cheerfully.  “We’ll leave you to it! Good luck!”  He flashed two thumbs up at Bill before following Harold back out the way they’d come, leaving their expert curse-breaker staring intently at the runes in front of him.  Bill was currently the senior wizard in Gringotts’ curse-breaking division, since his predecessor had died in a Death Eater raid three years earlier.  Which meant that all of the difficult curses and the like fell to him and his team.

Bill sighed out a long breath, his head tapping against the – thankfully unspelled – wall behind him as he stared at the runes, the shapes not making any sense.  If he didn’t know better, he’d think that it was just an odd story, or even just a random mixing of symbols and pictures, but if that were the case, it wouldn’t be _here_ , in one of the largest, most prominent pyramids in Egypt.  Whatever was in that chamber was something that was undoubtedly well-protected, or dangerous.  Possibly both.

After several moments of contemplation, Bill decided on a new tactic and set to work, trying to locate any woven spells, layers of magic laid on top of each other to bolster or alter the initial set-up.  It was possible that the presence of a curse breaker had triggered a woven spell and that had, in turn, altered other layers, until the entire spell was different.  Bill didn’t know, and it was frustrating.

Time was fluid here in the depths of the pyramids, and Bill had just found the central node – or what he thought was the central node, at any rate – when Alfred’s voice echoed across the hallway.  “The books have arrived,” he informed Bill cheerfully, holding one up in display.  Harold wasn’t with him.  “Umm…can you even read Draconian?” he asked next, his eyes bright with laughter as he grinned at the redhead.

Bill scowled, swiping the book out of his friend’s hands.  “Of course I can’t.  That’s what Charlie’s for,” he retorted.  Alfred’s grin just got wider, and Bill shook his head, an amused smile curling at his lips.  He gestured towards the runes on the wall.  “It’s some combination of woven and layered spells,” he said.  “The layers are woven in with each other, but not in order.  The top layer, for example, is woven into the third, sixth, and seventh layers.  The second layer is woven into the eighth.  The third and fifth layers are also woven into the eighth.  And they all crisscross over each other.” 

He let the awe color his tone, impressed despite himself.  Most wizards, when they wove layered spells, just linked them in order, so the first layer was woven into the second, which was woven into the third, and so on until all present layers were locked together.  Unraveling one layer would lead directly into the next, rather than this tangled mess that he had to deal with now.  And while determining how the layers were linked was a step forward, the fact remained that he didn’t actually know what the spells themselves _were_.  Still, progress was progress, and Bill welcomed the challenge.

Bill flipped through the book, carefully holding his wand away from the ancient pages, his eyes skimming over unfamiliar symbols.  The letters – if that’s what they were – scrawled across the page in no discernable order, seemingly just thrown onto the page wherever there was room.  Some lines were straight, while others curled in half loops and circles, and still others were written straight down or diagonal.  Bill’s eyes blurred as he stared in the dim light of the corridor, and he sighed, shutting the book as carefully as he’d opened it.  Wordlessly, he handed it back to Alfred, who tucked it under his arm.  “Bill?” he asked, his tone almost concerned.

Bill waved his hand dismissively.  “It’s nothing,” he reassured the other man, staring broodingly at the symbols carved into the pyramid wall.  “I’m going to work for a little longer before dinnertime,” he mumbled.  “Could you bring that back my tent?” he asked, gesturing at the book.  “And the others?”

Alfred smiled.  “Yeah, sure,” he agreed easily, his eyes slipping to stare uneasily at the glowing runes.  “Just don’t stay here for too long, or we’ll have to send a rescue party,” he teased, the joke falling flat.  Bill grinned back at him anyhow, and Alfred took his leave.

He waited until Alfred had disappeared from sight, then turned back to scowl at the ruins.  Raising his wand, he got back to work.

He’d break the curse yet.

 

~*~

 

The next morning brought Bill some welcome support.  He hadn’t made any further headway on the spells outside the primary chamber, and the runes had shifted again.  However, when Bill had woken up that morning, Charlie had been there, grinning at him, holding the portkey in one hand, his skin tanned dark from the Romanian sun.  He had a healing burn on one forearm, and his hair was a bit singed.  There had apparently been other injuries, but the mediwitches had tended to the worst of them already.

“They told me not to come back for three days, until all the lotion is gone,” Charlie shrugged when Bill asked about his most recent acquisitions, holding up a small jar of burn cream.  “The Hungarian Horntail didn’t appreciate our efforts to save her egg from being crushed.”  Bill snorted; of course Charlie would be the one working with the most dangerous dragon breed of them all.  And a nesting mother, at that.  He had probably even volunteered, the twit.

Charlie grinned at him, his eyes sparkling.  “Since your owl came at the same time, I figured I might as well spend my downtime in Egypt.  It’s better than going back to the Burrow, at any rate.”  Bill grimaced in sympathy; Molly would have been all over her second oldest son if he came home with dragon burns.  Again.

Bill slung his arm around his brother’s shoulder.  “Let’s get some food, then I’ll show you the runes,” he suggested.  Charlie made a sound of agreement.  Before they left, Bill carefully shrunk the books from yesterday – he hadn’t made much headway with matching any of the image – then led his brother to the mess tents.

After a quick breakfast, during which several of Bill’s coworkers came up to them to greet Charlie, Bill led the other wizard into the pyramid.  Charlie looked around as they walked, but didn’t protest as Bill led him straight to the corridor outside the primary chamber and gestured to the runes.  “They changed again,” he scowled, glaring at the new symbols.  Once again the only similar piece was the image of a dragon.  A Chinese Fireball, perhaps, going by the red.

The younger Weasley raised an eyebrow at him.  “They do that often, then?” he asked, sounding far too amused for the question.  Bill grumbled an affirmative back at him, and Charlie’s grin got wider.

“It changed colors, too,” he observed.  Charlie looked at him, and he shrugged.  “Green, blue, red.  I’m waiting for purple, honestly.” Charlie chuckled dutifully, then went back to studying the runes.

“Curse breaking isn’t exactly my area,” Charlie pointed out mildly.  “But you’re right, this does look like the language of dragons.  What have you got so far?” he asked.

Bill told him.  It took a while to get through everything, since Charlie had to keep stopping him so that he could explain the more complicated pieces, like the way the curses or spells were interlocked with each other, or the fact that the runes and spells kept changing every night, necessitating starting from scratch again.  By the time he was finished, it was well past lunchtime, but neither wizard was hungry.  Nobody had come looking for them, either, so Bill figured that they’d probably come get them for dinner if they hadn’t shown up by then.

“So if we don’t get this figured out tonight, it will change again?” Charlie checked.

Bill nodded.  “If it keeps doing like it has been.  I don’t know if it’ll go back to a previous set of runes or not, and how long that might take if it’s on some sort of rotation.”  Charlie nodded, pulling one of the books towards him.  “I copied down the runes from yesterday,” Bill added after a moment, pulling out the parchment.  He hadn’t done it with the first set, because he hadn’t been expecting them to change.

Charlie looked at it, then looked at the wall, frowning.  Bill eyed him warily.  “What is it, Charlie?” he asked softly.

Charlie pointed at a handful of the symbols.  “They aren’t the same language,” he stated confidently.  Bill stared at him.  “If it is dragon-speak, then it’s different dragons.”  His eyes brightened as he grew more animated.  “These spells probably all have their own language, based on whatever dragon is drawn.  It’s a hint, or something,” he added.

Bill nodded slowly, pieces slowly falling into place.  “That would make sense, if the runes have done this before,” he murmured.  “That way, whoever was in charge of this chamber would know what they had to avoid on any given day.”  Charlie nodded enthusiastically, his eyes turning to focus on the Chinese Fireball.

Then he frowned.  “Bill,” he asked slowly, “do you know of any books that have the language of a Chinese Fireball written?  And what type of dragon is this?” he added, pointing at yesterday’s runes.  Next to them was a quick sketch of the first day’s dragons, drawn from Bill’s memory.  “I don’t recognize it.”

Bill stared at his brother in shock.  “Wait a minute!  You know every dragon there is!” he protested.  “And even ones that are extinct.  How can you not recognize this one?” he demanded, his finger stabbing at the parchment.

Charlie shrugged.  “Maybe they don’t really exist.  Maybe they went extinct before proper records were kept.  Or maybe they’re just made up dragons with made up rules,” Charlie replied.  “All I know is that this isn’t like any dragon I’ve ever seen, so unless your drawing really sucks, I haven’t got a clue.”  Then he glanced back at the red glowing symbols on the wall.  “Which means we’d best get this figured out today,” he suggested.  “Since we can’t know if tomorrow’s dragon will be one we’ll recognize.”

Bill growled in frustration.  “So, in other words, we might have to give up,” he said, hating that the words needed to be spoken at all.  Giving up wasn’t in his nature; it wasn’t in any of the Weasleys.  They were too proud and too stubborn to just leave things alone, regardless of how hopeless they might seem.  Usually, it paid off.

Charlie shook his head.  “Not exactly,” he answered.  He gestured at the books that Bill had unshrunk and spread out between them.  “Draconian isn’t actually a language.  Dragons don’t use written words.  These books are made from human interpretation of the sounds and gestures that dragons make. 

Bill stared at him blankly.  “Which means what?” he asked at last. 

His brother grinned.  “Which means that we need to speak with Gwyneth,” he said reasonably.  Bill had no idea who this Gwyneth was, but Charlie spoke again before he could ask.  “She’s another dragon tamer.”  Ah, that explained quite a bit.  “She works a lot with the Chinese Fireballs, since they’re a bit calmer and more likely to be willing to share space with other dragons.  But if anybody has access to books written regarding the Fireball’s language, it would be her.”

Bill nodded.  “That’s great.  Any chance you can get that soon? As in, right now?” Bill asked.

Charlie was already standing, heading back out towards the pyramid’s entrance.  “I’ll be back in a while.  In the meantime, feel free to keep working. Just don’t set off any traps, okay?”  He waved nonchalantly back at Bill, who just shooed him off.

Bill turned back to the runes, running the same basic spells as yesterday, finding the similarities.  The number of layers was the same, and they were linked in the exact same way as they had been yesterday.  Bill stared at the runes again, his mind running back over his short conversation with his brother.  Then he was hit with a revelation, and wanted to smack his head against the nearest wall.  The runes weren’t changing to be difficult.  They were trying to be helpful.  If the symbols were written by humans interpreting the sounds of dragons, then like Charlie and Gwyneth, not every human would know the language of every dragon.  By shifting every night, there was a chance that whoever was trying to access the primary chamber would recognize the language and be able to break the dark magic.

Now that things were starting to make sense, Bill picked up his wand.  He might not know the exact nature of the curses and hexes and protection spells yet, but he had a pretty good idea of what he might find.  There were a handful of counterspells that could be used neutrally.  If they worked, they would unweave some of the spells on the chamber.  If they didn’t work, they wouldn’t set off the dark magic.

Knowing that Charlie would return as quickly as he was able to, Bill got to work.

 

~*~

 

By the time Charlie returned, Bill had finally managed to break at least two curses and was in the process of eliminating another one.  The first spell he’d broken had simply been a Misdirection Hex, which would have been tripped if he had gotten to close to the entrance.  It would have worked somewhat like a Notice-Me-Not, except that instead of not seeing a person, Bill wouldn’t have been able to locate the entrance.  The linked spell would have more or less led him around in circles until somebody found him to break him out of it.

The second curse had been a bit more lethal, designed to remove all the air from around an intruder.  Bill would have suffocated, unable to speak the counter-curse.  He had shuddered when he broke that spell, grateful that he had discovered it before trying to enter the chamber.  It wasn’t a commonly used spell, since most death spells were far faster and couldn’t be undone with the simple expedience of having a second person nearby.  Spikes, falling stones, fire, killing curses…those were the usual spells put on places to keep intruders from entering.

“I see you’re actually making progress,” Charlie teased good-naturedly as he entered the corridor, holding a thin book in his hands.

Bill shook his head.  “These aren’t the same spells as yesterday.  The spells change with the runes, and I had no idea where to even begin, to be honest,” he admitted. “And even if I had, I probably wouldn’t have tried to unravel them without knowing the founding curse.”

Charlie raised a single eyebrow at him.  “Oh? Then why are you breaking them now?” he asked.

Bill snorted.  “Because if we don’t break them tonight, we don’t know when the spells will give us another language we have a chance of cracking,” he retorted.  “So far, none of the curses that I’ve broken have been linked to the primary.”  Which was fortunate, because if all of the curses had been linked to the foundation, Bill would have had to bring the others in here to attempt to snap all of the curses at the same time, in order to keep any one of them from triggering the rest.  But it seemed like these curses had been laid intentionally so that a single witch or wizard could unravel them.  If they were careful.

Charlie gave a neutral nod, then moved closer, glancing at Bill as he did so.  Bill finished his stabilizing spell, which would keep the remaining spells from tightening and keep the broken spells from repairing themselves, then gestured him forward.  Charlie looked at the first symbol, then flipped through the book, using his wand to find matches, his eyes intent.

Bill pulled out a small stack of parchment from his pack, along with a self-inking quill – he’d have to remember to thank his brothers for that next time he saw them – and got to work, dutifully writing down Charlie’s murmurs and musings.  He figured that they could sort out the unimportant stuff later.

As he wrote, Bill found himself growing tenser.  There were some nasty curses guarding the chamber, some of which Bill hadn’t ever heard of.  He was going to have to call in some of the goblin curse breakers at this rate.  Their magic, like that of the House Elves, worked differently than wizards’ magic.  Bill’s team simply wasn’t equipped to deal with vaporizing acid and soul-stealing shadows.  Not even the Death Eaters could think up some of these curses, and Bill found himself morbidly fascinated in whatever witch or wizard had come up with them centuries earlier.  The magic had undoubtedly been lost by now, and Bill was finding that even with the help of the goblins, they’d probably have to invent some new spells.

Unfortunately, that meant giving the runes time to change again, and possibly to reset, giving them entirely new curses to deal with.  How long would it be before this particular set of runes and curses returned? How many different languages were set into the wall?

Charlie wasn’t having any better luck than Bill was.  Even with the letters and words that he could match up, there were still too many blank spaces for the warnings to make any sense.  Or perhaps the words explained what was inside the sealed chamber instead.

It was late afternoon when the first of the goblin Curse Breakers arrived.  Bill debriefed them, loaned them the book that Charlie had brought back from the Dragon Nursery, and left them to it.  Maybe they could at least figure out the cycle, if they couldn’t figure out the spells.  And their record-keeping was impeccable.

“So, that’s it?” Charlie asked as they retreated to his tent with their food. “Just call in the specialists and be done with it?” He sounded vaguely disapproving. 

Bill gave his brother an amused look.  “They’re going to have to create entirely new spells, Charlie,” he pointed out serenely.  “Or else rediscover very old ones.  There are at least sixty-two different languages in there, and we have no idea what any of the others are yet.  Which means that they’ll work on spells for just the one language, although I’m sure they’ll take note of any other recognizable dragon runes.  So that gives them – and us – just over two months to figure things out.  Or else we’re going to four months, then to six.  But the goblins are good.  Money isn’t the only thing they keep a tight grip on,” he added cheerfully.  Charlie grinned; it was a well-known fact that goblins hoarded magic with even more fervor than they did gold.

“And is it worth it, do you think?” Charlie asked, glancing back once more at the pyramid towering above their encampment in the fading light.  “Whatever’s in there?”

Bill shrugged.  “Most likely,” he allowed.  “For something to be guarded that fiercely, it’s probably either a really high-profile figure – like their king – or a hoard of treasure that would put the Gringotts vaults to shame.  But even if it isn’t, it will be worth it to the goblins to have knowledge of previously unknown – or unremembered – magic.”  Knowledge and money equaled power, after all, among the goblins.

“And what will you be doing in the meantime?” Charlie asked.

Bill grinned.  “Exploring the other chambers.  Working with the goblins.  They aren’t as versatile as wizards when it comes to creating new spells.”  He felt his smile widen, anticipation already curling through him as he turned around to face his brother, walking backwards through the camp.  “Just think about it, Charlie!  Whatever’s in there has got to be amazing, to have that kind of magic protecting it.  And most of the spells aren’t like anything I’ve ever seen, or even heard of!  What is a Rune Hex?” he mused out loud.  The words had been on the wall, but he didn’t know if it was referring to an actual spell – maybe the one that changed the runes – or a piece of the runes themselves.  Or perhaps the interpretation was wrong, and it didn’t say Rune Hex at all.

Charlie chuckled, shaking his head.  “It’s good to see you so excited,” he admitted with a grin of his own.  Bill reached out and wrapped an arm around his brother’s neck, pulling him into a headlock and ruffling his hair while Charlie struggled and cursed good-naturedly at him, his hands batting ineffectively at Bill’s arms.

“Oi, Bill! Charlie!” Alfred was waving to them, and the two brothers headed his way.  “I saw the goblins show up.  So you’ve got some free time now, right?” he asked, grinning.

Bill and Charlie looked at each other, then nodded.  Alfred clapped his hands together.  “Great!  How would you two like to see crystallized dragon scales?  They were in a treasure room, and I don’t know that I’ve ever seen a dragon that color before,” he admitted.  He grinned at Charlie.  “Right up your alley, isn’t it?” he asked.

Charlie’s eyes were glowing.  “I’m in!” he announced, striding off after the curse breaker.  Bill just shook his head and followed.  There would be time enough for small talk later.  Right now, there was a pyramid to explore.  And dragon scales to identify.

Bill chuckled to himself.  Typical.

 

~*~

 

It took nearly five months for the entire team of goblin and wizard curse breakers to create the counter spells to the Fireball Runes, as Bill had started calling them.  The name had stuck.  There were several other spells in the works as well, for other languages.  Some of Charlie’s coworkers had been called in to try and identify the various dragons that showed up on the runes, though those were hardly the only creatures on there.  There were hippogriffs and mermen and acromantulas, along with several creatures that had probably been native to Egypt at one time, like the sphinx and something that might have been a camel – if camels had eight legs and spat poison.  Whoever had created some of those languages, or spells, had been well-versed in creatures from around the world.

Some of the animals, there was no known language for.  Some were extinct.  Others might have never existed at all.  There really wasn’t any way to tell.

The day the Fireball Runes returned – for the third time - Bill stood amongst a phalanx of wizards and goblins, all of them working spells at the same time.  Some spells needed multiple counterspells, others just needed a boost in strength, which meant extra wands.  Anybody who wasn’t necessary for spell-breaking had been evacuated to the perimeter of the encampment, just in case something should go wrong.  Spell backlash wasn’t exactly particular about who it took out.

Bill was laying down stabilizing and shielding spells as quickly as he could cast, trying to keep the dark magic from retaliating and striking out.  The counterspells the others were using weren’t the original ones intended to break the curses, and so it fought back, recognizing an intruder.  But the goblins had done their jobs, and the dark magic was dissipated, though the process was painstakingly slow.  Bill’s arms were shaking, his voice hoarse from calling out spell after spell.  All around him were runes that he had drawn on the stones, helping to buoy his own magic, to make the protections last just that much longer.

Too many people had been required to cast the counter magic.  Bill should have been among them, too, but he was needed for this instead, as the strongest single wizard of the lot of them.  The goblins’ magic was too focused, too precise, and too different to protect their wizarding counterparts.

Bill felt sweat slipping down his robes, his skin clammy.  In front of him, tendrils of dark magic snapped and hissed, trying to find breaches in his shielding spells, struggling to disrupt the stasis that Bill was trying to keep the magic under, to keep it from overflowing.  The voices of the goblins rose.  Normally, Bill could understand gobbledygook fairly well, but right now, his attention was focused elsewhere.  He just had to trust that they knew what they were doing.  Whatever was in this chamber – or whatever they suspected was in the chamber – had them all excited and eager to break the spells.

Vaguely, Bill wondered how long he’d been standing here, casting spells.  Some of the others weren’t looking too well.  Time really had no meaning here, in the darkness of the pyramids.  They were deep enough that the sun didn’t reach, and none of them had the energy to waste on a Lumos spell, so the only lights came from the sizzle of spells and the eerily glowing runes.

One by one, the runes cracked or faded or simply dissolved, practically melting back into the stonework.  Bill felt his arm dropping, and he braced himself, determination holding his hand steady as he snapped out spell after spell.

When the last spell – the foundation – was finally broken, the backlash slashed out at them with a scream of dark magic.  Bill swore, hearing similar words echoed from all quarters.  Now that the spells were broken, those who had any energy to spare set about containing the magic that had broken loose at the end, keeping it from doing any further damage.

Finally, everything fell quiet.  Not even the faint buzz of magic surrounded them anymore, wizards and goblins alike too depleted and the runes finally silent.  Bill swallowed, the sound loud in his ears.  “Is it done?” someone whispered.  Bill didn’t know who, and couldn’t bring himself to care.  Instead, he looked over at Randstad, the head goblin for this expedition.  The shorter creature nodded, and a relieved rippled passed through those present.  Bill sagged in relief, leaning heavily against the wall behind him, dropping his trembling hand after securing his wand back in its holster.

After a moment, he looked up to see Randstad observing him.  “Sir?” Bill asked, because he had learned long ago that regardless of what most of the wizarding population believed, goblins were very intelligent and very good at what they did.  They were worthy of respect, perhaps more so than certain pureblooded wizards, he mused with dark amusement.

The goblin pointed at him, and then two other wizards – Alfred and another wizard named Callum that Bill hadn’t yet had the opportunity to work with, but that was apparently moving quickly up through the ranks of curse-breakers.  Five other goblins moved forward, and Bill realized that for some reason or other, he had been granted the honor of entering the primary chamber in the first party.  He smiled, straightening up and moving forward.

Once he had everyone, Randstad moved forward, and the others moved with him.  Behind them, the remaining curse breakers spoke quietly among themselves.  Now that the spell casting was done, people from the encampment would be coming, bringing food and water and potions to help them recover their energy.

Bill stepped cautiously through the large opening that had appeared in the wall leading into the central chamber.  He gazed up, his eyes wide.  The whole middle of the pyramid was a single room, completely hollow.  There were no fancy decorations, no lights, not even any warnings.  In fact, there was nothing to detract from the simple stone altar in the middle of the floor.  A coffin sat upon it, but Bill couldn’t detect any magic.  Had all of the magic gone towards protecting the chamber, leaving none left for inside?  Or was whatever was in that coffin something that magic could not be used to protect?

“Ah, it is as we thought,” Randstad said, his tone filled with smug satisfaction.  Bill frowned, but kept silent; Goblins held their secrets close to their chests.  They had allowed three wizards into the chamber, and Bill wasn’t about to jeopardize that.  Next to him, Alfred shifted uneasily.  Callum just stared at the coffin with narrowed eyes.

As they moved slowly closer, careful not to disturb the peace more than they had to, Bill could pick out more runes laid about the casket and altar.  These ones, though, were familiar.  Where had he seen them before?

“Merlin,” Alfred breathed next to him, his voice low with shock.  Bill gave him a sharp glance, then turned back to the coffin.

Randstad walked right up the altar steps, one long-fingered hand reaching out to hover over the stone etchings.  “This is indeed Merlin’s grave, undiscovered for thousands of years.”

Bill stared around Merlin’s burial chamber in wide-eyed wonder.  How the bloody hell had Merlin ended up buried in Egypt, of all places?  Shouldn’t he have been in England, gone to wherever the rest of King Arthur’s court had disappeared to when Camelot had fallen?  Unless, of course, he had not been there in the kingdom’s hour of need.  According to legend, Merlin liked to travel, and would go away for years at a time, though he always came back when he was most needed.  But he hadn’t returned that last time.  Had he already been dead?

Randstad was positively gleeful.  He had no particular fondness for Merlin, considering that he was a human wizard and not a goblin, but the mere fact that those in the employ of Gringotts had found one of the wizarding world’s greatest heroes was of great interest to him.  Bill sighed quietly to himself in resignation; once the Ministry found out about this, there would undoubtedly be intense negotiations.  Bill hated politics.

The goblins directed Bill and his companions in securing the site – they could not risk moving Merlin from his resting place without further study – and then shooed them out of the chamber.  Alfred was grumbling about the secrecy spell they’d been placed under – not dissimilar to the Unbreakable Vow in the wizarding world.  Bill wasn’t particularly fond of Non-Disclosure spells, either, but the fact remained that Gringotts was his employer.  Therefore, he had an obligation to keep their secrets, provided that it wouldn’t cause untold casualties in the wizarding or Muggle worlds.  Since the goblins had no interest in either world beyond how much gold and treasure they could provide, it had never been an issue.  He winced; he had no doubt that the Daily Prophet would tear into the non-goblin curse-breakers as soon as they got wind of what was going on, demanding to know why they hadn’t said anything.

They walked undisturbed back outside, the stars shining brightly around a full moon.  Callum slipped away once they were out, heading for his team.  Bill enjoyed the cool breeze after the stifling air of the pyramid, the chill invigorating him considerably.  “Well, no point in worrying about it, mate,” he said, clapping Alfred on the shoulder.  “Besides, can you imagine the look on Fudge’s face when the goblins approach him with this?” he said gleefully.  Alfred snorted, but his lips curled up into a grin, and Bill laughed.  “See? That’s the spirit!” he declared.

When they reached the camp, Alfred broke off, his shoulders bowed under his exhaustion.  Bill yawned, glanced at the mess tent, then decided that he was more tired than hungry and made his way to his tent.

Slipping inside and shucking off his shoes and shirt, Bill stumbled towards his bed, the last several hours finally catching up with him.  Even the excitement of having found Merlin’s tomb wasn’t enough to keep him awake any longer.

Just before he collapsed onto the bed, he noticed the book.  On the front were several dragons, and the book itself seemed to be made of dragon hide.  Bill picked it up, not bothering to check it for curses – if anybody could slip a cursed book into a camp full of curse-breakers, they deserved what was coming to them – and flipped it open.  Inside were sixty-two chapters, one for each dragon.  Several of the chapters still had empty pages, where they hadn’t yet been able to translate the language.

Inside the cover was a note.

 

_Let us know when you’re done, yeah?  And Forge wants a copy, too._

_-Charlie_

Bill grinned, dropped the book on his nightstand, and collapsed into bed.  He wondered vaguely if there was any discovery that could top this one.  Perhaps it was time to return to the Burrow, at least for a while.  From the letters he’d been getting, home was just starting to get interesting.

Bill dropped off.  When he woke back up, he’d put in for a few weeks leave.  After all, he’d earned it.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope this was at least something close to what you were looking for, maybe? I figured I'd put both brothers in there, because why not? It was an honor.


End file.
